You're All I Have
by DeathByMushrooms
Summary: A series of vignettes about Sawyer and Kate, both together and separately, post-Island. Fairly pro Suliet and Jate. Chapter 3: "David." Kate finally gets the happy ending that fate had long denied her.
1. Jack is Dead

**You're All I Have**

**Chapter 1: Jack is Dead  
15 August, 2037**

**Summary:** After leaving the Island, both Sawyer and Kate are left to find a place in a world in which they feel they no longer belong. This is the story of how they coped, told in the form of several sporadic vignettes.

The first thing Kate had noticed was that it had not been huge. In fact, it had been rather modest; quite commonplace. She had never given much thought to Jack's long-term intentions, but on the rare happenstance that she had, she had always pictured it as being huge. It had not been like he could not have afforded huge, given his settlement with Oceanic and the handsome salary he brought home from the hospital. But for reasons probably only Kate would ever understand, it had been much smaller than she had admittedly expected.

When he had first shown it to her, it had not been the question itself or the earnest look in his eyes which had garnered her affection; it had been this little gem of predictability and safety responsible for luring her in. She had not been disappointed—quite far from it. She knew as soon as she saw it that this was exactly who he was, and she had actually appreciated the honesty. Perhaps that had been why she had said "yes" to begin with.

Jack Shephard had been the hero; the "knight in shining armor;" the man who had never asked for his fate—but who accepted it with both serenity and valor. All of these things had been true of him, Kate knew, but to her, he had been simultaneously something much less and something much more. His engagement ring had been a manifestation of this dichotomy; had forever endeared him to her—though she had ultimately given it back and had not seen it since. His need to prove that he had what it took—but also his initial reluctance to accept it when he found that he did—had been what had made him the man he was; the man who had been loved by everyone who had met him. Kate had been no different in that respect.

"Heya, Freckles," came James's voice softly from behind her as she sat in her favorite armchair by the bay window pondering a man long-since gone from her life. "You alright?"

She felt his hand come to rest on her shoulder, and she covered it fondly with her own. "Yeah. Just thinking."

"You're always thinkin' about somethin'," he mumbled, now squeezing her shoulders. He was silent for a few moments, both presumably now lost in their own respective worlds. "Got the kids to bed."

"All of them?"

"Yep." He eased himself onto the window ledge across from her, folding his arms across his chest.

"Very impressive. I think you might have beaten your own record." She smiled, but could not force herself to meet his eyes.

"Practice makes perfect, sweetheart. Two kids and four grandkids, you'd think a man would get it right sometime." Kate hated it when they did this; pretending the conversation that they were having on the surface had any amount of importance when both knew something more was going on underneath.

"Do you ever think about them?" Kate knew her tone was enough to suggest she was not speaking about their children.

"Kate—" His face fell, and he shook his head sympathetically.

"_Sawyer_, I've not been 'Kate' for at least thirty years…"

In his younger days, he might have argued with her, but the crinkled-eyed man in front of her only was silent in response. "'Course I do." She might not have heard him if he had not been so close to her. He did not meet her eyes, and she knew where his mind was. She had, in the course of the decades of their marriage, developed the ability to read his thoughts just from his facial expressions. "What'd Hugo have to say to you?"

"It's not important, James."

He nodded, glancing up at her from over the top of the ovular spectacles perched at the end of his nose. "It was about him." It was not a question, but a statement. Kate did not know why he was bringing this up to her now, when he should already know the answer—when so many years had passed since it had happened. "Well, what did he have to say? Four-eyes givin' him a hard time?" He smiled, and Kate could see a bit of his old self in his lined face.

She sighed. "He said that he couldn't talk about Jack. He said … he couldn't talk about him _to me_." It was the first time she had ever spoken Jack's name to James since they had left. Likewise, he had never as much as mentioned Juliet to her. The three years they had shared together were little more than a mystery to Kate. But what had happened, happened, and bringing it up to one another seemed to have been silently agreed to be fruitless and painful for both parties.

"That all he said?"

She tilted her head to one side. "Why are you asking me about Hugo now? It's been _years_, and you never so much as acknowledged that you saw him."

"Because you chose _now_ to bring them up. You broke the contract."

"There was a contract?" she half-laughed.

"Yeah, damn it, there was a contract. You don't talk about it, I don't talk about it. That's the way things have always worked." His brow furrowed, and she could easily sense that he was getting upset with the conversation at hand. He sighed and ran a hand through the short, grayed hair to which she had been forced to become accustomed. When he looked back up at her, he seemed much older than she remembered. "What did he say to you, Kate?"

She could feel tears beginning to sting her eyes, so she dropped them from his intense gaze toward her lap. "He said… he said that we would see them all again."

"You mean him and Bug-eyes and the rest?"

"No, James. _All_ of them. Everyone." She paused long enough to swipe at her eyes. "What did he say to _you_?"

His face hardened again. "Ain't none of your damn business."

"James—"

"No, that's _what he said_."

It was clear to her that James did not at all have it in his mind to tell her what had transpired between Hugo and himself some three decades ago. It seemed unfair that she would divulge the last of her secrets to him, and he was so unwilling to reciprocate. But if there had ever been one thing that she had been good at, it had been getting James Ford to do what she wanted him to do.

"James," she started delicately, lovingly, "please. I deserve to know."

"Damn it, Freckles." She could hear his determination breaking as his eyes darted from hers to his lap. "It's for your own good."

"I'm a big girl; I think I can handle myself." She laughed softly.

She was almost surprised to see that the look on his face was one of defeat, of sorrow. It made her uncomfortable, and she nearly regretted forcing it out of him. "Come here." When she did not move, he looked up at her seriously. "If you want to know, come here." He patted his knee.

Confused, especially considering how he complained of his knees hurting him more and more these days, she slowly lifted herself from her chair and settled into his lap. He ran a hand through her hair with one hand, the other wrapped protectively around her waist. She could not remember when the last time had been that they had simply sat this way—and sat that way they did for several minutes before James seemed to work up the nerve to tell her what she wanted to know.

"You ain't ever known me to be the one to beat around the bush or nothin' like that, so I'm just gonna tell you. Are you ready?" She nodded, and he looked terribly tortured. "Sweetheart, Jack is dead. Been dead since the day we left."

When Kate thought about Jack, she always tried to picture the time that they had spent together off-island with Aaron; of the time they had stolen. She tried to remember the way the little boy had told Jack he loved him every night before bed. She tried to imagine what it would have been like if that time had been allowed to continue; if the three of them had continued playing house. She knew that they would be married, that Aaron would call him "Daddy" and maybe there would be other children, too. Maybe James would have met and married Juliet, had the Island not intervened. Maybe they would have all been happy. She tried not to think this way too often, and in recent years she had managed to do well on that front.

Her life with James was wonderful—surreal, in a way. But they were both well aware that they were but second choices. The Island had stolen their gold medals and in the aftermath, they had found in one another a reason to keep living. James was caring and understanding, and they knew one another inside and out—they were made of the same stuff. But James was no Jack, and she knew that in the back of his mind, she would never compare to Juliet Burke. Maybe the ring James had planned to give to her had spoken of his character in the same way Jack's had spoken of his. But the ring he had given to Kate was only what it was supposed to have been: beautiful, expensive, and huge.

But in the instant that she knew Jack was dead, that maybe Hugo was wrong, that she would probably never see him again—James's ring was the only ring that had ever made a real impact on her life. She always thought that if he had died, she would somehow just know—that their love was so deep she would feel his death inside of her. But after thirty years of silently hoping that they would be reunited someday, in some unlikely way, Kate gave up on ever seeing Jack or his ring ever again.

**AN: **So this is my very first Lost fanfiction. At least, the first one I've ever posted. I'm kind of nervous about how I did (I know how tough Losties—quite rightfully—can be on their writers, haha), so it would be great if you could let me know. :-)


	2. Julian and Rachel

**Chapter 2: Julian and Rachel  
June 5, 2007**

**A/N: **So, whilst writing this chapter the relationship between Sawyer and Rachel just kind of took on a life of its own. I hadn't really expected them to get on so well, but I suppose they had other ideas. Haha. After re-reading what transpires between them here, it sort of reminds me of (if you've read the book/seen the film _Gone with the Wind_) the relationship between Rhett Butler and Melanie Wilkes (though far more poorly executed; I'm no Margaret Mitchell). So I'm happy with that sort of outcome.

James had been off-Island for nearly three weeks now. He was having trouble adjusting, to say the very least of the situation. The smog in the air, the people, the noise, the food… It all seemed terribly foreign and disconcerting to him now. He hated how invisible the stars were in the city skies, how easily everyone he met seemed to float through life, and most of all (but also perhaps most surprisingly) he hated how alone he was in returning to this old life which felt so repulsively new.

He had been alone getting off of the plane, which Lapidus had brought down safely on some Pacific island no one had ever heard of. Claire and Kate had both cried and hugged Claire's mother and Aaron, who had looked almost worriedly confused. Richard had walked around with stars in his eyes, in love with the world in a way James knew even then that he would never be able to feel again. Miles and Lapidus had smiled and discussed their plans from there. But James stood silent, watching his—well, they weren't exactly his _friends_—whatever they were to him, he watched the four of them celebrate. James had nothing much to celebrate, and no one with whom to share his thoughts. But it was just the same, because he wasn't sure he would know what to say to anyone who might have asked, anyway.

But there were two people in the States who weren't there, whom he very much wanted to see. He had thought of it as soon as he learned that he stood a chance of getting off the Island, but it was never really his idea. He had known for years that if the situation ever came to this, that this was what he would have to do.

That was how he had found himself not quite a month later in the living room of Rachel Carlson, surrounding by childhood photos of _her_ and a boy who looked astonishingly like _her_. He nearly did not have the guts to ring her doorbell, and he had found it hard not to lash out at her when she accused him of playing some cruel joke on her by bringing up her assumed-dead sister. He had almost broken down when he finally got through to her, having to tell her painstakingly intimate details of _her_ life: how she took her coffee; her feelings after her parents had divorced; the look she got on her face when she was thinking; the tone and pitch of her most sincere laugh…

He had gained Rachel's trust and by default the tsunami of questions that had built up inside of her for the past six years. But all that he could get out at first was that there had been an island; that he had been on Oceanic 815…

"Is she still there? I mean… is she—is she okay?" He could see in Rachel's face a look of desperation, but there was little hope left in her sad brown eyes.

Having to face the truth head-on caused his throat to constrict and burn. He could feel tears threatening to spill over onto his cheeks, and he had to look away from her. He barely managed to shake his head "no," trying with all of his willpower not to be reduced to a sobbing mess on her floor.

There was a very strained silence as both James and Rachel came to terms with what both had known was reality for longer than they had cared to admit to themselves. He could feel her eyes on him for several minutes before he had the courage to meet her gaze again.

"How exactly did you know my sister, James?" The calmness in her voice was staggeringly familiar, and he couldn't stop a single tear from rolling down his face.

He hesitated momentarily, meeting her eyes and holding them. "I reckon I was in love with her. I was gonna ask her to marry me, but guess I waited too late."

He was almost surprised when she smiled and let out a little laugh. "I'm glad. She deserved to be treated well. Though I'll admit, I didn't think the likes of _you_ were the sort of things she was getting into for those six years." She tilted her head slightly to one side. "Can you tell me, James? What went on there? How my sister died? How it is that you all survived there for so long?"

James shook his head, regaining his composure somewhat. "I don't think you'd believe me. I wouldn't believe me."

She shrugged. "The Oceanic Six were rescued from an island, and then they mysteriously disappear on an international flight, never to be heard from again? You say _you_ were on that flight, when _they_ said it was impossible for any more survivors to be found? James, I conceived a perfectly healthy son when I was utterly barren. My terminal cancer completely subsided, even when I had given up treatment. I'm open to believing that there are grander things in life than what we can immediately see."

James raised his eyebrows skeptically. He wasn't sure that what he had been through the past three years, the events that led up to Juliet's death, were at all believable. Most of the time, _he_ had hardly believed what was going on around them, just tried make sense of it enough to keep on going. Nevertheless, he recapped the last three years of his life, trying to place where Juliet had been and what she had been doing during the times before he had known her. And from the button, to the freighter, to the time-traveling—Rachel sat still, asking only the most pertinent questions, and James could see that she believed him. As he drew nearer to the last time he ever saw his fair-haired love, he could see tears in Rachel's eyes for the first time.

"…And then she asked me to kiss her, so I … I did. And then she … she was gone."

Rachel was quiet for a moment before she smiled, tears streaking her cheeks. "But she was happy, with you. I don't think our whole lives … that she was ever truly _happy_, the way a person deserves to be, at least for a little while." She stood up and took his hand, pressing him to stand as well. He was surprised when she enveloped him in a tight, familial hug—though perhaps more surprised at himself for not finding the situation strange and unwelcome. "Thank you, James, for making my sister happy."

During his long story, he had managed to keep himself together, but her hug felt like Juliet's, and he could see a light-haired boy getting off a school bus outside the window over Rachel's shoulder. He suddenly felt suffocated with guilt. "I'm sorry I couldn't save her. All she wanted was to see you and your son, and I wanted that for her, too, and I should have given her that… I should have saved her…."

Rachel stepped away from him and shook her head, still smiling through her tears. "You kept her safe for three years. I have only thanks to give to you for letting me know that my little sister lived for six years longer than I had thought, for finally letting me put her memory to rest."

"Who's this, Momma?" came a little voice from behind them as the door opened and shut.

James was immediately taken aback. The eyes upon him were piercing blue, the Caesar-cut platinum atop his angular face. The boy before James was the spitting image of his aunt.

"This is—" she tilted her head with a small smile as she found the appropriate words, "—your Uncle James."

James narrowed his eyes, instinctually turned off by having such a title bestowed upon him. But his face softened as the boy wrinkled his brow, and James was not for the last time reminded of the woman who should have borne his children.

"But I don't have any uncles." He dropped his bag to the floor and came to stand by his mother, who was but a foot from James.

Rachel knelt beside her son, placing a palm tenderly against his cheek, rubbing circles with her thumb. "This man knew your Aunt Juliet. Remember when I told you what a family is? Two people who love each other have children? Well, that is how it was with James and your Aunt Juliet. They loved each other, before she passed away to Heaven. So, if he would like—" she craned her neck up at James with a small smile, "—he can be your Uncle James."

"Is Aunt Juliet coming back, then?" He looked between James and Rachel, and then fixed his gaze on the former. "Did you bring her back?"

James had to look away, knitting his brow and putting on an irritated face—though the truth was that the child's words broke his heart all over again. "No. She's not coming back."

"My Mommy has always been sad, because she didn't know where Aunt Juliet is. Will she always be sad, if Aunt Juliet is never coming back?"

"Oh, Julie," whispered Rachel, wrapping the boy in a tight hug. "I'm so sorry you could see how sad it made me. But you know, you're the best thing that ever happened to me, my beautiful boy. I know what happened to my sister now, and I won't let that come between us ever again, okay?"

The boy grimaced, his cheeks reddening. "Aw, Mom, geez, I get it, I get it." He wriggled out of her arms and looked up at James, who wore his best poker face. "See you, um, Uncle James," he said before running towards the back door.

James shrugged, uncertain. "Later, kid," he called after him. Though he wasn't on the surface very sure if he would see Julian Carlson again, in the back of his mind, he was certain that he would.

"About four years ago, when I had to come to the conclusion that my sister was—that she was dead—I had it declared and bought a spot in a local cemetery. She's got a headstone up there. I had her maiden name put on it—that jerk Edmund Burke never deserved her…" Her faced hardened for a moment as she fixed her stare on something out of James's line of sight. As she looked back up at him though, the little smile was back on her lips. "I can give you the address, if you ever want to visit. I know it's not the same as the real thing, but it's been helpful to me, in letting go. Maybe you could benefit from a visit, too."

James sighed; he was ready to be out of Miami and back into the safety of his isolated world, living out of his suitcase and cheap motels."I'd appreciate that," he mumbled after a moment of silence.

As Rachel turned away to fetch pen and paper, James shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his jeans, looking out the window at the normalcy around him. He wasn't sure where he was going from here. Kate was living somewhere in Connecticut to avoid a scandal, and had left her home in Aaron's name. He knew Claire had gone to visit her mother and return to Aaron, that the pair of them would live with Kate until Aaron could understand what had gone on. Richard had told James that he planned to fall in love again and maybe lead a normal life: have children and grow old like anyone else. Lapidus had been apt to return to Costa Rica where he would live out the rest of his days in tranquility. Miles was going to dedicate his life to helping people, and had mentioned maybe joining a fire department or law enforcement. As for James, he had planned to set things straight with Juliet's sister, which he had now done, and he wanted to see his daughter, if he could ever work up the nerve.

But after that was done, what would he do? James Ford was legally dead, and without everyone else's cooperation, there was little he could do to restore his name—not that he had ever had much of a good name, anyway. He could do as Kate did: take on a new name and start a new life. What good would that do him, though? Unlike Kate and the others, James had no wishes or hopes. He knew he couldn't be Clementine's father, at least not in the way that he should have been to begin with; he couldn't sit around with Rachel and forever lament Juliet's passing, because he was smart enough to know when to let go.

No, James Ford was dead, and he had not been Sawyer for years. As Rachel hugged him goodbye and asked him to visit again soon, he knew that his new old-life would take plenty of getting used to, and that there was a long journey ahead just figuring out who he was.

**A/N**: Next chapter is titled "David." See you there. :-)


	3. David

**Chapter 3: David  
October 8, 2007 / November 20, 2009  
**

**A/N: **Just a quick question: is there a confirmed date for when the finale occurred? I've been guestimating May, but if there's a more concrete date I'll need to fix the dates given within the chapters. I decided to re-upload this after noticing a couple of errors.**  
**

Kate had heard since she was a small girl that bad things happen so that better things can come along. She had never really seen much proof for this allegation. Before her plane fell out of the sky in 2004, not much in the vein of "better" or even "good" had happened to her. Nothing she had really been able to hold onto, anyway; all that had been good had come to an end too quickly: her marriage to Kevin, her relationship with her father, her friendship with Tom, and ultimately her freedom and innocence.

Oddly enough, after living on the Island, things actually began to look up. There had been Jack... and when there wasn't, there was Sawyer, which had perhaps been selfish of her, shew knew now. She believed she had been given a chance to redeem herself there, and she had, she liked to think. But then they left, and she and Jack played house for a while. She almost thought this ending with him and with Aaron made up for her past—but that didn't last long, either, when Jack couldn't forget the Island and she couldn't quite leave behind Sawyer and Claire. And through everything that had occurred after returning, Kate still could not find her proverbial "happily ever after." Jack was probably dead, Aaron had returned to Claire, she had not seen Sawyer (_no, he's "James" now_) in several weeks, and she had had to change her name to protect them all from unanswerable questions.

For her first month back, things had not looked very good at all. She lived in southeastern Connecticut under her made-up name, and had dyed her hair blonde just in case. The media had been aflutter with the story of how the Ocean Six—minus baby Aaron—had gone missing and were assumed dead. There were conspiracies abound—but not even the wildest came within a mile of the absurd truth. She was utterly alone at first, then Claire and Aaron came to stay while Aaron was reintroduced to Claire. Kate had had to watch as he slowly began to forget her, and bond with his real mother. But then one day, things seemed like they were finally on a track to some sort of happy. Until four months later, that ended too, as all good things seemed to do for Kate.

It was quite late when she worked up the nerve to call him. She had been home from the hospital since around noon, but she had been too numb to do little more than lay in bed and wonder why she couldn't cry. Now, she knew she couldn't do his alone—not right now, not just yet.

"Sawyer?" she whispered, her voice hoarse, before he had even spoken a salutation into the phone.

She heard him clear his throat groggily. "Freckles?" he said in the same low tone. "Somethin' wrong?"

She sighed, rolling over onto her side. "Yes."

"What is it?" He sounded more alert now. "Are you hurt? I'm in New York. I can be there in an hour."

"Can you?" She did not recognize her own voice, it was so weak and small.

"You sit tight. I'll be right there." She could tell by the sudden shuffling on the other end of the line that he was telling the truth.

"Thanks, James."

"Is it okay if I hang up? I can stay on if you need me to."

She could almost smile at how open he was with his concern these days, so unlike the person she had first met. "Oh no, go ahead."

"Alright. See you soon. Call me if you need to."

"Okay. Bye."

She seemed to hardly have the energy to move the cell phone from her face to press the "end" button. But she did, and rolled herself over onto her back. She had not bothered to undress or pull the bedsheets back, and she was not sure how she would ever sleep again after this. She had not even been able to take her mind off of it long enough to eat or wash her breakfast dishes or vacuum the hallway as she had planned. So there she had been all day, and there she lay for the next hour until she heard a knock on the front door. When she was not loud enough for him to hear her say that it was open, he let himself in, and she was almost immediately looking him in the face.

"Kate?" He spoke softly, as if loud noises might harm her further. "It's four a.m., what're you doing in those clothes? What's going on?"

She managed a weak smile, having not heard his voice in person for weeks—maybe months. But it was all she could manage just yet.

James shed his jacket and shoes, coming to sit beside her on the bed. "Look, you've gotta tell me what's up. I did ninety the whole way here, that's gotta be worth a little detail."

She glanced up at him from underneath her eyelashes. "I lost it," she managed feebly, unable to bring herself to elaborate any further.

His brow wrinkled. "Lost what?"

"I named him David. I thought about Margaret, after his mother... But he was a boy, so it was David."

She could see something peculiar flash in his eyes, but she could also see that he did not understand. Maybe he even thought that she had finally become dislodged from reality and sanity. "Sweetheart, I don't know what you're trying to say. Is this about Aaron?"

She shook her head, staring up at the ceiling. "No, James... No." She turned over onto her side to face him. "The night before we left L.A., to come back to the Island, I was... _with_ Jack."

It took him a moment to say what she could tell he had immediately grasped, what she lacked the fortitude to come out and tell him herself. "Kate... were you... pregnant?"

Finally, the crying came and she had to wipe tears off her face as she confirmed his question with a nod. She could see the pain in his face as he laid himself in front of her, wrapping his arms around her, letting her bury her sobbing face in his chest. It felt better to cry than she had imagined it would.

"James… You don't have to do this. I know this is a lot... You don't have to be here."

"If you meant that, you wouldn't have called me."

This was enough to silence her for now. She tried to move her head from his chest, but he only held her tighter, and Kate wondered just how long it had been since they had last lain together.

"Calm down. I ain't lettin' you go." He ran a hand through her hair and brushed a small kiss to her crown as he did so. "And I don't care what you say or how hard you push me away, you ain't doin' this alone, either. So just sit still, will ya?"

Kate obliged, and continued to lay with her head on his chest, reacquainting herself with his heartbeat. As they lay in her tiny bedroom in the darkest pre-dawn hours, Kate's tear-stained face began to dry and the pain gripping her body subsided somewhat. But sleep seemed to be no friend to either of them just yet.

"Juliet wanted to have a baby," said James abruptly, and though Kate's ears were directly below his chin, she could barely hear him. "When you all came back, we'd been trying for maybe a few weeks. We didn't expect to see any of you again, and Amy's pregnancy went over well… She wanted a baby, and I was happy to give her one. I suspect—" his voice broke, but he carried on in a way that Kate would never have been able to do, "—that she mighta been pregnant when she died. She was gonna take a test, said she had all the signs." He pulled back from her just enough to be able to look into her eyes, which were brimming with tears again. "She wanted to name it Rachel, after her sister, if it was a girl—and David, after her father, if it was a boy. But I reckon I'll have to go the rest of my life never knowing, huh?"

"I'm so sorry, Sawyer—"

"My point is," he interrupted softly, placing his thumb over her lips, "at least you got to know, Kate. You had that baby inside you for five months, and you knew it was his, a part of him. It's almost like you got five more months with him. Way I see it, maybe that's just how things are supposed to go. I wasn't ever supposed to have Juliet; we were just livin' in stolen time. And even though you and Jack loved each other, maybe you just weren't supposed to be together in the end, either—and you can't have a baby by a man you weren't ever supposed to be with in the first place. If I learned one thing on that damned island, it's that fate don't work that way." He lowered his voice, moving his thumb from her lips to run the length of her jaw. "Maybe you and me, we're just meant to be alone."

She knew he didn't mean to be hurtful at all; she appreciated his unique brand of brutal honesty. More than anyone else's sincerest sympathies, it was this trait of his that had always seemed to get her through the toughest situations with which the Island had presented her. It was for this reason that she had immediately thought to call him before anyone else the first place. But what she was not aware of just yet, was that this would be the last time James ever spoke of Juliet, and the last time he would allow her to mention Jack.

"What were you doing in New York, James?" Anything to take the edge off the conversation.

"Ain't the time for that," he muttered.

She wrinkled her brow, a little disappointed with his answer, and settled back into his chest. "Have you seen Clementine yet?"

"No," he dead-panned.

"She's your daughter, James..."

"I know what she is, Kate."

"It's not 'Kate' anymore. You should remember that."

He chuckled, craning his neck back to look into her face. "Sweetheart, one of these days you've gotta quit pretendin' to be somethin' you're not. You're no more whoever the hell you're telling people you are now than you were Jack's little suburban housewife." He narrowed his eyes thoughtfully. "You're 'Kate Austen,' if I've ever seen her."

"And I guess you're 'James Ford' now, right?"

"You bet your sweet ass I am. I'm done with 'Sawyer' and all his bullshit."

"Then why were you in New York? There's nothing for you there. Your _family_ is in New Mexico."

His face froze. "Listen to me, Kate. She's my daughter, I know that, and I'll admit before anyone that I'm scared as hell about seeing her. I've never been nobody's _daddy_. But right now, I'm here for _you_. So shut up and let me take care of you."

So she did shut up and let him take care of her, and eventually fell asleep tangled in his arms, just as the sky was beginning to turn pink. The next morning, she awoke to him making her breakfast in bed. That evening he held her as they watched mindless romantic comedies on television, and then he slept over again, clutching her body protectively against his. Pretty soon that spot on the left side of Kate's queen-size bed became James's spot. His toothbrush found its way to a permanent position in her medicine cabinet, and somewhere along the line he obtained a well-paying job fifteen minutes out. Before she knew it, there was quite a vulgar diamond on her third left finger. Not long after that, James made it a matching set and Kate changed her last namefor what she hoped was the last time. He did indeed take care of her.

Now, sitting on the edge of their bed in the home James had recently purchased just outside Albuquerque, Kate was laughing through tears as she recalled the first night they had spent together off-Island some two years ago; the less-than-fortunate events which had drawn them together. In her lap rested a small white stick with a blue plus-sign on one end, and she had just heard the door open and close as James came home from work.

"Kate?" he called from downstairs, "you home?" When she didn't answer, he called again, "everything alright?" Then she saw his face appear in the doorway with a small, worried wrinkle between his eyes. "There you are. How come you didn't answer me?"

She looked up at him and smiled broadly, holding the plastic stick up for him to see, barely holding back tears—but not tears of the same sort that they had been that first night. These tears were much happier. "We're pregnant!" she finally managed, standing up.

His eyebrows shot up with surprise. "You sure?"

"I've taken four tests with positive results this week, I'm almost a month late, and the smell of that cologne you're wearing is making me want to vomit; I'm pretty damn sure," she half-laughed.

He let out one whooping laugh before dropping his briefcase to the floor and effortlessly scooping her up under the arms where he held her against his shoulder. She could feel his tears rubbing off onto her cheek as he kissed her neck, the closest bit of skin to him. "Baby, that's the best news I've ever heard," he whispered into her hair.

Juliet's David, Kate's David—she had come to terms with the fact that neither child had been meant to walk this earth with their surviving parents. A part of her hoped that if fate had been cruel enough to take her tiny, stillborn son away from her before she ever met him, that his father would be there in the afterlife to protect and watch over him. She knew the same had to be true for James's child, as well, as hard as she knew it was for either of them to contemplate such subjects. But now, this time, things were different. The tables had turned, and life had given James and Kate the chance to have what had been robbed of them.

And it was in that moment, in the arms of the man who had fixed her—the man she had eventually had to fix, herself—when Kate finally got her better things to come.


End file.
